Phone Call
by my calico
Summary: The last thing that Jade expected to interrupt her all-nighter was a phone call from Beck Oliver. So, naturally, that was exactly what did.
1. A Story To Tell Your Friends

_Don't go away again  
__I want to be more than a phone call at four a.m.  
__Seems like every time you come back home,  
__It's just to steal my heart and leave._

**_- A Story To Tell Your Friends by Every Avenue_**

* * *

The last thing that Jade expected to interrupt her all-nighter was a phone call from Beck Oliver.

So, naturally, that was exactly what _did._

She sat there, with the script she was revising open in her lap, safe from her red pen and its rather brutal margin notes ("If this dialogue gets any sappier, I'm going to kill someone" and "It's YOU'RE not YOUR, what are you, five?", among others) for the moment. She looked askance at her pear phone ringing incessantly at arm's length atop the table. It was probably just Cat, with her nth up-to-the-minute update on what was on her mind at that moment. Or it was Vega pleading for her to go easy on her script. Jade smirked. Well, too late for that. She reached for her phone, only to hastily drop it again when she saw whose name was on the caller ID.

It was Beck.

He had mercilessly spared her from the post-breakup coping mechanism that was purging him from her life by insisting that they not divide their friends between them. So they were technically still friends, which meant she couldn't exactly delete his phone number (although, after seeing what he _almost _tried with Vega the night before the Platinum Music Awards, she had no problem with gleefully parting with some of his photographs with the use of her favorite scissors). This had not been a problem, because they never called each other after the breakup. Until now, that is: two-thirty-seven in the morning on a Thursday, a month, six days, and ten hours since they stopped seeing each other. Not that she'd been counting.

With a quivering hand, she picked her phone up again, her thumb hovering over the 'Accept' button. What was the big deal, right? He probably just wanted to ask her something school-related, and no one else was up at this hour. But just the thought angered her. So they could be friends when it was necessary for him? Just like they had to break up, because it wasn't fun anymore, wasn't convenient being her boyfriend anymore? She pressed 'Decline' instead, not wanting to deal with this right now. She was going to end up saying something she would regret, and she had been doing so well keeping it in. Beck didn't even know she knew about Tori and the attempted kiss, and if she picked up, she just might slip, even if his only intention was to talk about Sikowitz's assignment.

She tossed her phone back on the table and returned to the script on her lap. Her brow furrowed as she strained to concentrate. She was halfway through correcting a grammatical error when her phone rang again. Her blue eyes darted up to check the caller ID. It was still Beck.

She groaned, half-wanting to turn the damn thing off, but half-wanting to just ignore it and let him stew a while. Then when she saw him tomorrow she could just say, "Oh, I'd set it on silent and went to bed, sorry" and be let off the hook. Or not. When it came to Beck, she was never let off easy. That boy could read her like a book. If she did feed him that excuse tomorrow, he'd know it was deliberate. The ringing died, and her phone had just registered the missed call when a new one was coming in.

"Oh, for Christ's sake," she mumbled in exasperation as she grabbed her phone. She took a moment to get good and angry, so that when she finally pressed the 'Accept' button, she gave a very convincing, and not at all bewildered, "_What._"

_ "Heeeeey Jade," _he slurred from the other end of the line. _"What're you doooing?"_

She wrinkled her nose at the overfriendly greeting. It was either he hit his head and lost all memory of the breakup, _or _he was drunk. Since this was clearly not a romantic comedy (like Vega's script was trying to be), she went with the latter. "Are you drunk?" she asked bluntly.

_"I-I think so," _was the stuttered response.

She rolled her eyes out of force of habit more than anything. "Don't tell me those guys down at the club actually bought that fake ID of yours. You are obviously not twenty-six," she muttered quietly. She hated to admit it, but she was a little worried that he was out, and drinking, at this time. It was almost three and he sounded way too drunk to drive himself home.

He had the audacity to laugh. _"Don't hate me just because you got thrown out. Apparently you don't make a very convincing twenty-one-year-old." _There was an odd familiarity to his voice. Fondness. Maybe he was too drunk to remember they weren't a couple anymore.

Jade didn't know how many times she had repeated that sentence in her head since the call started – 'we're not a couple anymore'. As if she had to remind herself, too, because that fondness? She felt it too. It was an effort to keep it out of her voice. Two years of seeing each other was not going to be erased by a mere month or so apart. She knew that well enough, but she just didn't want to sound like the loser in this whole arrangement of theirs.

She pouted at what he had said, but didn't give it a reply. "Well, what is it?" she snapped, trying to sound as authoritative as ever, even though the question really had been hanging over her head since their conversation began. "Why did you call?" There was an inadvertent softening to her voice that she _detested, _but she said nothing more as she waited for his reply.

It was, _"Nothing, I just missed you."_

What surprised her even more was that it wasn't in a slur or anything. It sounded like the most clear-headed thing he'd said in this entire exchange, even though it clearly made the least sense. She couldn't speak, couldn't think of anything to say to that. Her heart was pounding in her ears. She was a writer; she imagined things, and she refused to admit just how many times and in how many _variations _he had said those words to her. Never had she actually thought she would hear him say them. In all those scenarios, she imagined an immense sense of gratification, but if it was even _possible, _this was breaking her heart even more.

"No, you don't, you're drunk and you just think that," she told him quietly, but she couldn't help but feel that it was partly for her own benefit. Then, a little more firmly, she added through gritted teeth, "Go home, Beck."

"_N-no, I r-really do miss you, Jaaade," _he slurred, slightly bemused by the sound of him. _"I miss your hair and your eyes and your lips and your fingers and your –" _he stopped there, and she heard a short, low chuckle from the other end. _"I wanted to kiss you today. I really did. But it wouldn't have been right." _

She didn't know what she should have said to that. In a better world, probably, she would have said, "I missed you too" or "Why didn't you kiss me?" Because Lord knows that no matter how many times she had tried to block the mental image out of her head, all she ever wanted to do these days was march up to him, wrap her arms around his neck, run her hands through his perfect hair… But there was no guarantee she wasn't going to be hurt, and that kind of pain wasn't the _good kind._ And because it wasn't failsafe, Jade did what she did best instead: be cynical.

"Because we broke up," she answered flatly, a little more sullenly than she would have liked. Because they _were _broken up. Why the hell was he even saying all this? On the one hand, it was so unlike him to be so vocal, to tell her exactly how he was feeling without her asking. On the other hand, it was _so _like him, as well. It was like she was finally hearing him without the filters, without the stoic façade. Who knew it would take alcohol to do that? Maybe if she had learned this sooner, no one would call them out for having had 'communication problems'.

"_Because we broke up," _he echoed, and somehow that made it sound like an ultimatum.

There was silence on both ends for a while. Jade stared dispassionately at the script she was still holding, her blue eyes not really seeing it at all. She sighed as she tossed it on her table. Picking herself up, she lay down on her bed, her eyes closing. This conversation was exhausting. She thought she had enough caffeine in her to keep herself going until roughly six in the evening that day, but apparently all it took was a phone call from Beck to prove her wrong. "Go home, Beck," she mumbled again, finally breaking the silence.

"_I meant it when I said I'm tired of the fighting, Jade. I don't want to yell at you. I don't want you to be mad at me. But I'm not tired of you. I can never be tired of you. I love you and sometimes I just wish that were enough to make things right, but I screwed up. I forgot the best things about us and forgot that we were my favorite part of my day. I screwed up…"_

She couldn't hear this right now. She didn't know what hurt worse, the memories his little speech was digging up, or the knowledge that had he been sober, his sense or his pride would not have let him say any of it. The worst part of it was that he said 'love', like it wasn't over for him. Just like it wasn't over for her, and her insistence on calling him her 'ex' or saying that they were 'broken up' was only meant to reassure her. She held her tongue, refusing to let go of the "I love you too" on her lips. There was no point telling him if he wouldn't remember any of this in the morning.

A bit more silence, before the fuzzy voice came from the other line. _"Can I come over?"_

She snorted, a welcome respite from the tears that were welling up in her eyes. "As if you could make it all the way from the club to my house without passing out."

"_I have, actually. I'm outside."_

His words made her shoot up and clamber off her bed to the window. She pulled up the window and stuck her head out to look. Standing there in the balmy night air, on the sidewalk in front of her house, was Beck Oliver, all smiles as he looked up at her from under her window.

"What are you _doing _here," she demanded, speaking into her phone, as she didn't want to wake anyone else in the house. It was not a question at all.

So he didn't answer it. The same goofy grin on his face, he asked, _"Can I come up?"_

There was a trellis right under her window that Beck used to climb to get up to her room back when they were together. She looked down at it now, raised an eyebrow (though she knew he probably couldn't see the expression), and said with a smirk, "I'd like to see you try. 'Cause in the state you're in, there's about a ninety percent chance you're going to fall and break your neck."

"_Then I'll ring the doorbell," _he said.

Her eyes widened. "You wouldn't!" she hissed. But by the time she had looked, he was making his way to the front door.

_Shit. _

She ran out of her room and down the stairs, only barely swinging the door open before he pressed the ringer for the doorbell. Out of breath and livid, she stood there with him on her doorstep, and he looked like he had won this little game of theirs. There was a look in his eyes she knew all too well, all dark and full of need, but there was a smile on his lips that said he hadn't been this happy in a long time. It disarmed her. Then, before she had time to react, he leaned in and pressed his lips to hers, chastely, innocently, and pulled away after a moment. An all too brief moment that tasted of whiskey and regret. As he parted from her, though, the smile on his face was serene. Content. She bit her lip, keeping back an angry comeback at bay. How could she _ever _stay angry with him?

"Get out," she mumbled as she pushed him back away from her doorstep. She saw the confused, crestfallen look on his face before she grabbed the keys from the drawer and added quietly, "I'm driving you home. Get in the car."

It was a silent ride to Beck's place, save for the music she put on to fill the awkward silence between them. She tried to focus on the lyrics, instead of what had just happened between them. Beck, she could see, was fighting to stay awake, fighting not to pass out. What all that effort was for, she couldn't imagine, but she was grateful she wasn't going to have to haul him into his RV all on her own. She pulled up at the curb by his house quietly, let herself out and helped him get to his feet. He hobbled along as best as he could, but she could tell that the liquor was getting to him. She had helped him into bed when he pulled her closer and whispered in her ear.

"Stay with me."

She looked at him ruefully. "You won't remember any of this in the morning," she whispered back.

"I want to," he murmured, his words stringing together until they were no longer coherent. "I want to remember. Help me remember." There was a flicker of a smile on her face as she sat down next to him and waited for him to finally fall asleep. She wasn't going to help him remember. If she was lucky, he'd think it was all a dream.

**Author's Note: **So this is my first fic in a _long _time. I haven't written much for the past few years being busy with school, but I decided to get back into things now that stuff has cleared up considerably. Still, I know I'm a pretty rusty and this is my first Victorious fic. But go ahead, don't be gentle, rip it apart. I welcome it. Also! I'd really like a beta reader to bounce ideas off of and to look over my stuff if anyone's interested in doing that. I think I'll just be doing one-shots, so it's probably going to be an easy enough job? Haha. Anyway, it would be nice to know what you think.

**Disclaimer: **None of the characters of Victorious are mine, and the song I quoted at the top isn't mine, either.


	2. Think Of You Later

_I miss the long drives, the car rides, the bad fights, the good times  
__The way you make me feel will never leave my mind.  
__Think of you later in my empty room  
__Where I, I, will fall asleep alone._

_**Think Of You Later (Empty Room) by Every Avenue**_

* * *

The day began with the stale aftertaste of alcohol in his mouth and a guilt-ridden monster of a hangover. Why he'd been drinking eluded him those first few hazy moments. He ran a hand through his messy dark hair and pushed the sheets off him, deciding that staying in bed was not going to make the migraine go away - and that the sunlight streaming in from his windows wasn't helping matters, either. _Coffee_, his half-asleep brain murmured to him, and he nodded. That sounded like a good idea. With monumental effort, he pushed himself up off the bed and staggered off to the little makeshift kitchen area of his RV. His brown eyes fell on his PearPhone, with the voicemail indicator blinking insistently. He pressed the unlock button as he rummaged the cupboards for his caffeine fix.

There was static for a moment before a voice came on. "Hey man." That was Andre. Flashes of yesterday came back to him, but he fought them down. Coffee was more important than remembering right now, as far as he was concerned. On the phone, there was a pause, before he added, "Hope you got home all right. You were really hammered." A chuckle. "Totally understand if you decide to call in sick from school today. I know you're still hurting over the Jade thing…" The voice paused, in time with his own hand on the cupboard freezing before the voice continued, "Oh dang, sorry man. Anyway, call me, Beck. Later." The phone beeped once and went silent.

Right. So it wasn't all an alcohol-induced nightmare. He and Jade really had been broken up for a month or so now, since that day that he told her he was tired of fighting. Since that day that she _thought _he told her he was tired of her. There were still times he woke up and _forgot, _woke up and panicked that she wasn't right there next to him. There were still times he got up and, seeing how _alone _he was, wondered if it was all just a bad dream. It had been so natural; for more than two years, she was the constant in the chaos that was life at Hollywood Arts. Now that she was gone, he felt lost, like there was a part of him ripped away. He had to re-learn what life was like before she was in it.

If only he was half as articulate or half as humble, he'd be able to get the words out.

But he wasn't. So he plunged himself into school, into his other friends, into the Northridge girls who showed up at his house every morning to hitch a ride to school and play with his hair. He threw himself into everything that could take his mind off the fact that despite everything, despite the popularity, he was alone. He didn't stop himself to think, didn't stop to let him be haunted by the curse of _having _too much time on his hands. But it was inescapable. When he came home from school and lay in bed at night, he couldn't help but think of _her. _As easy as it was to put his mind to the rest of the world during the day, at night she always came back to him.

And he cursed himself for it, because he'd been doing so well trying to move on.

He checked the time. It was a quarter of an hour to eight and no matter how quickly he got dressed, he wasn't going to make it before school started. He figured he'd miss first period in favor of grabbing coffee to stave off the hangover, because he didn't trust his hung-over brain to make coffee that didn't have the consistency of pond slime. He got ready and slipped his phone into his pocket before he got into his car. He drove to Jet Brew and grabbed his usual large cup, and deciding he had a bit more time to spare, stopped to drink a little. He took his phone out to read whatever messages he missed yesterday.

There was a gap of a couple of hours in his memory. He remembered the day before; he remembered looking at Jade from across the room and thinking how pretty she looked that day; he remembered cursing himself for thinking that. He remembered asking Andre if he wanted to sneak into a club with their fake IDs; he remembered ordering the first drink or two; he remembered Andre leaving early, because he didn't want to make his grandma worry. After that, it started to get hazy. He didn't remember paying the tab, or walking out of the club. He didn't even remember going home… what _had _happened to him last night?

He thought he remembered calling Andre when he left the club, just to assure him he was leaving. Maybe his call history would have the time and he could piece things together from then? He opened up his call logs. Sure enough, listed at two-ten in the morning was a call to Andre Harris. But it wasn't that call that got him thinking. It was the ones listed above it.

Two-thirty-eight, Jade West. Call duration: 0:00.

Two-forty. Jade West. Call duration: 0:00.

Two-forty-one. Jade West. Call duration: 9:46.

His heart skipped a beat.

He definitely hadn't remembered calling _her. _His coffee sat on the counter of Jet Brew, all but ignored as he strained to think about what happened. He understood the two missed calls; she barely even _spoke _to him since the breakup, except to snipe at him repeatedly. But she had taken the last one, and stayed on for almost _ten whole minutes. _His head spun with questions. What did they talk about? What did he say? An intense trepidation gripped him. Trepidation that he had said too much. He didn't know what was worse – if he had yelled at her and started another screaming match while he was drunk, or if he had spilled his guts to her and told her just how much he missed her since they broke up. No, that wasn't true. He knew that the latter was infinitely worse.

All of a sudden, he dreaded coming to school that day.

Reluctantly, Beck got back into his car and drove to Hollywood Arts in time for second period. He entered Sikowitz's classroom, checking first to see that Jade wasn't in there. He didn't know why, but he wasn't looking forward to seeing her this morning. After discovering that he drunk-dialed her last night, she probably wasn't all too pleased with him either (besides the fact that she hadn't been too pleased with him since they broke it off). She was probably going to yell at him for waking her up at half past two in the morning, and he was never going to hear the end of it.

He was still standing at the doorway when he heard her voice. "Sometime today?"

He turned to face her, then, unguarded, with a slightly lost expression on his face. Seeing that, herface held a flicker of alarm, doubt, and – was that sadness? – before it returned to impatience. "Never mind," she mumbled as she pushed past him and took her usual spot in the back.

What was that? No snide remark? No yelling or pushing? It was a telltale hint that more happened last night than he thought. Before he could stop himself, he reached out and took her by the arm. "Jade," he said, quietly, with a hint of pleading in his voice. It was killing him, not knowing. The pained expression touched his eyes for once, because he didn't bother being guarded. Just the thought of all the things he could have said and done last night was wrecking him in the worst way.

She flinched at his touch, but only barely. "What," she still managed to say, but not as scathingly as she used to. There was something on her mind, obviously, and he could tell it was the same thing on his. She struggled to be let go, but no one else was in the room and class wasn't starting for another ten minutes. They both had the time to spare. It was just a question of whether she would tell him in that time. "Let go of me," she said, jerking her arm away from him as she turned away. "What do you want, anyway?"

His mouth went dry. "I called you last night," he managed to say.

"This _morning, _at three a.m., to be precise. Thanks for that, by the way. It wasn't like I was planning to sleep or anything," she replied none too gently. Oh well, at least she didn't deny it. That was a start.

"What was it about?" he asked her. He doubted she was going to give it up too easily, but it was worth a shot.

She smirked. "Nothing you'd have the balls to say sober, let me tell you that," she answered, a bitter smile on her face but a sad glint in her eyes as she did. Before he could protest, Cat and Tori walked into the classroom talking loudly about an assignment in another class, effectively cutting short the exchange. Jade seemed only too relieved to be free of Beck, taking her seat next to Cat as she joined in the conversation (after a fashion – if insulting Tori's grammar as she handed her what looked to be a script full of red markings qualified as 'joining in a conversation').

Beck ran a hand through his hair. He paid little attention to Sikowitz when the class finally started. His mind was on Jade's words and what they could possibly mean. Why did she have to be so vague? But then, far be it for Jade to go easy on him for _anything. _He only wished he could remember… he leaned back against his chair and stared out the window as he strained to recall exactly what had gone on last night.

Clouded images came to him, but they felt like a dream. In them, he walked the empty road from the club towards his house; he hadn't meant to, but somehow he found his way to her street and stood under her window. And he was looking up at her, and her rolling eyes, the expression she always made when he came over, pretending she wasn't happy to see him. It was as if nothing had changed.

And she came down to meet him.

And he _kissed _her.

He didn't know where the drunken haze of last night ended, and where the dream began. It all seemed far too good to be true. But there was nothing for it; he knew now what he told Jade last night, knew exactly what it was she wanted to hear from him while he was sober. Or at least he had a good idea. It was what he felt now, what he _knew now _with certainty. He still wasn't half as humble or half as articulate to be able to say any of it, but he knew that there was no better time than now.

Somehow, the class had ended without his noticing, but he didn't care. As the rest of the class filed out of the room, he stopped Jade before she could leave. Tori and Cat gave her a worried look, but she nodded to them, motioning for them to go ahead. "What is it, Beck?" she asked him once they were finally alone. He looked down at her, her wide, expectant blue eyes. There was not even a hint of a smile on her lips as she waited for him to get on with it.

"I can't stop thinking about you, Jade. I want you back. I want _us _back."

She scoffed. "Good try, but that's not exactly what you said la—"

He cut her off as he pressed his lips to hers gently, catching her off-guard as he had last night. And like last night, she was too stunned to be the first to pull away. As quickly as he leaned in, he pulled away. He remembered the feeling of her lips on his and he knew that last night was not a dream in the least.

It took her a moment to find the words. "Well," she said with a slow smile, "That part, you got right."

* * *

**Author's Note: **I wasn't going to continue this, because it was a oneshot, but so many people asked for a continuation that I caved eventually. I'm not too sure I'm happy with this (because I gave it a happy ending and I wasn't going to write Bade a happy ending until they got back together, but screw it), but I hope you enjoyed it anyway. And if you didn't notice, I ship Bade and Every Avenue. This song especially sums up how I feel Beck _should _feel after the breakup. If you haven't heard the song, you should go listen to it! (And make a fanvid because I suck at those hahaha.)

P.S. This will not have further updates, I mean it this time! xD

**Disclaimer: **I own nothing.


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